by John Bowers
“Oh, shit!”
“Don’t worry, I got it.”
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to—”
She hurried around the counter.
“I’ve got it.”
Red in the face, he nodded again, and without another word, escaped out the front door.
*
Dougherty had been gone less than ten minutes when the outer door opened again. Kristina looked up to see a man about Dougherty’s age step into the shop. He was dripping as he wiped his feet on the mat that lay inside the door. A glance at the window and she saw the rain had intensified into a downpour.
She smiled at the stranger.
“Hi. Can I help you?”
He walked toward her and stopped a few feet away. Not only had she never seen him before, but he was dressed differently than most Trimmer Spring residents. His hair was long and stringy, soaking wet; his beard was thin, scraggly, and unkempt. His pants hung halfway down his hips and his shirt, which hung on him like a soggy tent, was faded and stained. Instead of shoes, he was wearing leather moccasins that had seen better days.
Moccasins? On a rainy day?
He stood staring at Kristina as if he’d never seen a woman before. She was used to it, of course—it came with the territory if you were a Vegan woman living on a foreign planet. Most men realized they were staring and recovered rather quickly, but this one did not. He continued to stare.
“How can I help you?” she repeated. “Are you new in town?”
“Huh? Oh, uh—no, I live down on the plain. About twenty miles from here. I don’t get into town all that often.”
Kristina nodded, but something in his words didn’t ring true. The Trimmer Plain was home to a pair of religious cults, and this guy clearly wasn’t one of them. Furthermore, the cultists would never be caught dead in Suzanne’s. Their preferred mode of dress was Nineteenth Century North America, and anything sold in the boutique would be considered decadent, sinful, even satanic.
“Look, I hope you can help me. My wife just had a baby, and I want to get her something special.”
Kristina nodded. He was standing close enough that now she picked up a stale, musty odor about him. This guy is married? Rain or no rain, he hadn’t bathed in days, maybe longer.
“Well, congratulations to both of you! What’s your wife’s name?”
“Hm? Oh, uh—Heather. Her name is Heather.”
“What did you have in mind? Clothing? Jewelry? Cosmetics?”
His eyes left her face for the first time and began scanning the counter.
“Um, I’m not sure exactly. Maybe a pair of earrings. Something not too expensive. I don’t have a lot of cash.”
“Okay. Well, I should point out that this is a high-end boutique. Pretty much everything we sell is imported from Vega 3, and because of that, we’re a bit more expensive than some other shops.”
“Uh-huh.” He frowned and reached for a pair of earrings dangling from a counter-top rack. “I think she’d like these. How much are they?”
Kristina didn’t even have to check the price tag.
“Four hundred terros, plus tax.”
“Four hundred! Jesus Christ!”
“I’m sorry. But I warned you.”
“Don’t you have anything cheaper?”
“Not much, I’m afraid. Maybe you would prefer an item of clothing? We have a wide variety of garments, including some really sexy underthings.”
He continued to stare at the jewelry, then gazed around the shop.
“How do you people stay in business with prices like these? This is a small town, I can’t believe people here can actually afford this stuff.”
“Some people can’t, others save up.”
He shook his head in wonder, his expression turning angry. He glanced at Kristina with hostility in his eyes.
“Looks like I made a mistake coming here. I guess I should have known better.”
Kristina tilted her head, wondering what the hell that meant.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t help you,” she said.
He didn’t reply, but turned for the door, shaking his waist-length hair as he opened it.
“Congratulations on the baby,” she said to his back.
He went out the door without another word.
Lago District – Tau Ceti 4
“Tinker-Smith!” Victoria frowned. “Sounds British.”
“British? I’m not familiar with that.”
“Someone from the British Isles. Great Britain, on Terra.”
Lard Davis shrugged. “Don’t know too much about Terra.”
“Does he have a funny accent?”
“Who, Tinker-Smith? Not that I noticed. His accent is pretty much like yours.”
“Then he isn’t British. The name is a fake.”
“How do you know that?”
“You said his first name is Ken?”
“Yeah. Kenneth, actually, but everybody calls him Ken.”
“Let me guess—he’s white, about forty, and has wavy, salt-and-pepper hair that is starting to thin? Kind of pasty complexion. Real friendly in a phony sort of way? Showed up with an entourage of six or eight people in their twenties, both male and female?”
Davis looked perplexed for a moment, then nodded.
“Yeah, that’s about right. How did you know?”
“His name isn’t Tinker-Smith. He’s Kenneth Saracen.”
“Who?”
“Kenneth Saracen. He’s a terrorist. You were right about Nick—he is a lawman, and he’s here to find Saracen.”
“No shit!” Davis looked extremely pleased with himself. “How about that!”
“I need you to show me where Saracen lives. You said it’s only fifty miles?”
“About that. Forty-five by now, I guess.”
“Take me there.”
“What’re you gonna do? Shoot him?”
“I would love to, but that’s Nick’s job, not mine. I just want to see where he holes up.”
Davis put his foot down and the taxi increased speed. The road was fairly straight for several miles, winding now and then to follow the contour of the mountains. A narrow but fast-flowing stream appeared on their right, passing under bridges on both the highway and railroad before it twisted to the right to parallel the road. Victoria gazed in admiration at the natural beauty of the surging water.
“You have a lot of rivers here,” she said.
“Yes, Ma’am, they run every which way. This one feeds the lake up in Lago District.”
“A lake? How big is it?”
“I’m not sure exactly. Maybe two, three miles across. You’ll see it before we get to the town.” Davis frowned. “Well, maybe not. Tinker-Smith’s estate is on this side of the lake, the town is on the far end.”
Victoria felt a tingle of anticipation. They had traveled fifteen or twenty miles since Davis had identified Ken Saracen as Ken Tinker-Smith. She wasn’t at all sure she was doing the right thing, but if she could get eyes on Saracen’s hideout, it might help Nick plan how to take him down. She fingered the rifle as they continued down the highway.
They drove another ten miles in silence. The terrain changed little—hills, an occasional peak, lots of forest, and the river still ran along the railroad on their left. For a couple of miles the railroad divided into parallel tracks where trains could pass one another, then merged again into a single line. She felt her pulse increase.
“How much farther?” she asked.
“Not far. Five or six miles.”
They met a logging truck, an old-fashioned cargo diesel pumping black smoke into the atmosphere. They also saw a couple of passenger cars. They were getting close to some kind of civilization.
“I don’t think we need that heater anymore.” The sun was high enough that the air outside had warmed considerably.
Davis turned it off.
“You sure you want to do this?” he asked. “If what you say about Tinker-Smith is true, he might not take kindly to anyone nosing ar
ound his place.”
She sucked a deep breath and let it out with a puff of her cheeks.
“I need you to do me a favor.”
“And what would that be?”
“I’m going to leave my rifle with you. I need you to return it to Nick.”
He took on a perplexed look.
“Okay…”
“And he’ll pay you for my excursion. A hundred taus, right?” Her blue eyes bored into him.
Davis shrugged.
“Whatever you say. If he doesn’t pay, I’ll just keep the rifle.”
Victoria laughed.
They rounded a curve and Davis slowed. A hundred yards ahead, a side road branched off into the trees. Next to it, a railroad spur paralleled it.
Davis slowed some more, then turned onto the side road.
“This is it.”
They drove a few yards down the side road, which was narrow but well maintained.
“What’s the rail spur for?”
“Tinker-Smith has his own train. When he wants to travel, he doesn’t mix with regular people.”
Victoria felt her pulse increase even more. This had to be the right guy.
“Also,” Davis said, “he brings in building materials by rail. His castle isn’t quite finished yet.”
She gave him a sharp look. “His castle?”
Davis stopped the car and nodded straight ahead. Victoria followed his gaze.
“Yeah,” he said, “I would call it a castle.”
She stared in mute disbelief. Directly in front of her, not more than two hundred yards away, the ground rose sharply to a height of about a hundred feet. Perched on the top was the largest building she had yet seen on Tau Ceti 4, maybe bigger than any building she had seen on Alpha Centauri 2. It was built entirely of stone, and though one section was yet unfinished, it certainly was—or looked like—something from the medieval period of Terran history. A castle. Her mouth fell open and her eyes grew wide.
“Jesus Christ!” she whispered.
It was a monster building. The outer wall was perhaps fifty feet high, with defense towers on each corner; the center of the building rose another fifty feet and was topped by spires that must offer a view for miles in every direction. As big as it was, it was a compact structure perhaps a hundred yards long and fifty wide. The road led to a small parking lot at the near end of the building, beyond which she saw a heavy wooden door flanked by stone pillars.
“How long did you say Tinker-Smith has been on this planet? Two years? This thing must have taken ten years to build.”
Davis chuckled.
“He didn’t build it from the ground up. Some other rich guy started it about fifty years ago as a hotel. The story goes that he planned to advertise it in the Federation as a vacation resort, but he died before it was finished and whoever inherited his money abandoned the project. It sat vacant until Tinker-Smith bought the property and moved in. It was ninety-five percent complete when he took it over.”
“Who did he buy it from?”
“Lago District. When the rich guy’s heirs walked away from it, they forfeited the whole thing for taxes. Didn’t want to be bothered with it.”
Victoria shook her head.
“Unbelievable!”
“So!” Davis stared at her. “You getting out here, or what?”
Victoria hesitated a moment. Did she really want to do this? If she did, how would she get word back to Nick to report her findings?
“Is there any bus service around here?”
Davis nodded. “Sure. Just walk out to the highway and wait. There’s a bus every couple of hours. You can also probably flag down a train. But…”
“But?”
“Well, I hate to abandon you here like this. Especially if what you said about Tinker-Smith is true.”
She smiled.
“If you go find Nick and tell him where I am, then it will be okay. You’re not abandoning me.”
“If you say so.” He still looked skeptical.
Despite her misgivings, Victoria made a decision. With a smile she stepped out of the car, pushed the rifle toward Davis, and slung her purse over her shoulder.
“I’ll be fine. Just go find Nick.”
She closed the door and turned toward the castle.
*
Victoria walked into the trees so she wouldn’t be easily spotted and proceeded alongside the rail spur toward the giant building. This was so typical of Saracen, she thought. It perfectly fit his megalomania, his aspirations to greatness. He saw himself as a king, above the common people, and this would be his headquarters when he became ruler of the planet. He wouldn’t need an army to defend this place—it was so formidable that nothing on Tau Ceti could overwhelm it. She could only imagine his delusions of grandeur.
She heard voices up ahead, and the sound of electric motors. A few yards farther on, the rail spur split into four separate tracks, all of which extended another hundred yards. Through the trees she got a glimpse of two utility vehicles, scaffolding, and five or six men crowded around a flat-bed rail car on one of the spurs; it was loaded with stone blocks. She heard the whine of a saw and picked up a whiff of dust as two men shaved the corners off a granite block. She slowed her pace, letting the trees screen her from sight as she made her way past the workmen.
The castle mound was now between her and the highway, but because of the foliage she couldn’t see what was at the end of the tracks. Tense as a coiled snake, she moved carefully, her heart pounding and her breath coming in shallow gasps. She wasn’t exactly scared, but her nerves were taut.
Stepping carefully to avoid snapping any fallen twigs, she kept moving. The voices faded behind her, the whine of the stone saw became less shrill. Twenty yards farther on, she peeked out to see the end of the rail spurs. To her amazement—and somewhat to her delight—she saw a steam locomotive sitting on the outside spur next to a squat water tower. Attached to it was a small tank vehicle and a single, rather luxurious passenger car. This must be Saracen’s ride when he left the castle. It must be very cool to ride around the country in a coach like that, she thought; the interior was probably pretty plush. Probably had a kitchen and everything.
Even more amazing was the fact that the steam engine was…steaming. She didn’t know much about such things, but with a more modern vehicle she would have expected to hear the engine running. In this case, the entire thing was the “engine”, and someone had lit the boiler. A wisp of smoke curled from the overhead stack and puffs of steam escaped some of the vents along the main barrel of the locomotive. She smelled hot lubricating oil and could actually hear a faint chuffing sound.
She kept moving among the trees until she reached the end of the rail spurs. Looking up, she saw the west end of the castle as well, a looming monstrosity that blotted out most of the sky. For a moment she felt almost giddy, as if she had stepped out of a time machine. She was looking at two objects that did not fit the same time or place—a huge stone castle and an ancient railroad locomotive, neither of which was contemporary with the other. It felt like a dream, or some kind of amusement park.
Not sure what she was going to do next, Victoria squatted down beside a tree and just gazed at the scene. Nick would find this very interesting, but so far she hadn’t learned anything that would actually help him. She had to assume that Saracen was inside the castle, along with an unknown number of his followers; the only way to know that for sure would be to get inside, but how did she do that? She certainly wasn’t prepared to climb the outer wall, and except for the door facing the highway, she hadn’t seen any other entrance. She realized she was ill-prepared for this type of scouting—she hadn’t even brought binoculars with her.
Shit.
She looked at her watch. It wasn’t even noon yet, and she was already getting hungry. She hadn’t brought any food, either.
Shit.
She took a few minutes to study the castle walls, in particular the towers. They were located on each corner, each covered by a co
nical roof that looked something like a mushroom. She saw apertures that, in ancient times, might have been arrow slits, but in this case could hide rifles or machine guns. Some ten feet above the apertures, each tower featured an open parapet; stone columns supported the roof. The parapets were empty, but that was no surprise—unless the occupants were under siege or expecting an attack, the towers wouldn’t likely be manned.
Still…if Nick or anyone else should threaten this place, those towers could become deadly.
Victoria sat there for twenty minutes, thinking. She wished she had a pocket phone with her, wished a pocket phone would even work on this planet. But, as if she had stepped out of a time machine, she was stuck with the technology that was available—or in this case, not available.
Shit!
She got to her feet and began to move.
She continued on past the steam engine, past the end of the rail spurs, and made her way deeper into the woods. Soon she could no longer hear the stone saw or the chuffing engine. After a couple of minutes she stopped and looked back. The entire west end of the castle was now visible, bigger and more forbidding than ever. About two thirds of the way up the wall she saw a broad window that must have been forty feet wide. It reflected daylight and she couldn’t see through it, but assumed that anyone standing behind it would have a pretty good view of where she was now. Could Ken Saracen’s quarters be on this end of the building? Did he use that window to survey what he considered to be his kingdom?
She continued walking to the west. Unfamiliar birds chirped overhead, some of them swarming in mad circles through the treetops. She broke out of the trees and stood at the crest of a hillside that dropped at a forty-degree angle toward a broad, beautiful lake that suddenly appeared before her. She stopped and caught her breath. The lake stretched for two miles or more, ending in an indistinct tree line on the far end. It was a beautiful sight, and from the castle window the view must be spectacular.
She sat down again and studied the slope leading down to the lake. It was fairly even, with a few rocky outcroppings interspersed with clusters of trees. It looked like an easy climb down to the water, but she wasn’t inclined to go that way. She studied the shoreline but saw no buildings. No houses, no piers, no boat docks. Except for a narrow dirt road just above the shoreline, it looked pristine, as if no man had ever set foot there. The air was fresh, perfumed by evergreens and a few wildflowers.